Yes, of course it does.

The first example of violence being used (and sensationalized) in media I'd like to look at is the 2006 release "300", which was unrelentingly violent for violence's sake. This clip shows what I'm saying pretty well: (embedding disabled, watch here) I'd actually like to tie into three points instead of two because I feel that the movie connects with all three quite strongly. First, and most primal, is that we love movement, and one of our favorite types of movement is combat. It's exhilarating, and we're biologically built to think so. The frenetic and vicious pace of combat appeals to us on a very basic level right down to our Sympathetic Nervous System, which creates our fight-or-flight responses (note: both of these options contain copious amounts of movement). So, when we see 300 Spartans absolutely shredding this giant Persian army, flowing around in their crimson cloaks, slowing down then speeding up and cutting into a foe with pinpoint precision all while preparing to slay another, it excites us because movement is exciting.

The second point that this ties into is that movies can portray violence to an amazing degree with special effects. We see this in incredible detail in various parts of 300, especially in scenes of combat, where a favorite technique of the director's is to slow down the action about a 3rd of a second before the kill and then just as the blade strikes, it actually speeds up past normal speed for a brief second as we see the enemy being viciously torn apart by the strike, then returns to normal until the next kill. Also, the movie contains decapitations, an unusual amount of maiming, and many especially brutal kills where you can see a spear plunging into one side of an enemy and then coming out the other, which are all done with that same movie magic we all know and love.

Third and final is the point that says in so many words, heroes and villains don't just talk, they fight. This is absolutely true in 300, with the Spartan side being painted as the heroes that defend their homeland against impossible odds against a foreign invader come to destroy everything they've ever known (and I'm not saying that the portrayal is unfair, look at history) whereas the Persians are portrayed as heartless animals that go into another country and plunder and murder and destroy. In one scene, we see an in-depth view of what goes on in the Persian king's tent, and it is portrayed as rife with hedonism and corruption. At a different point in the film, the Spartans come across a village that the Persian "Immortals" have completely destroyed, and have even gone so far as to spike the villagers to a tree. With this, we have a pretty clear setup of hero and villain, and then they fight. By God, do they ever fight.

There's another point that I feel is pretty important in our culture that 300 really couldn't address, and that's the concept that certain types of violence are engineered purely for comedy, and in the cases of animated movies, mostly for children. To show this, we'll look at the most classic of all classics, Looney Tunes. Ever since it's debut in the early 1930's, Looney Tunes has been the icon of animated violence. Most of the episodes seem solely based around the violence that occurs between two characters, (in this case Elmer Fudd and Bugs Bunny):

As we can see, Elmer takes most of the beating here and in the eyes of children, that's great because they want to see the bad guy lose (this is also a type of hero versus villain). This particular episode is violent, but we don't get into the trademark Viet Cong-like killing devices that many episodes feature (like grabbing a dummy filled with straw that looks like Bugs Bunny, which then pulls a rope that drops a giant anvil), and for some reason, that's insanely funny, usually with the greater attempted murder getting the bigger laugh. In Looney Tunes, hero always trumps villain and villain always takes a darn good thrashing before the end. Children love it, and always have. I know I still do.

Reporting on Nielsen

There were many things that surprised me in the 2009 Nielsen Report, but chief among them were the two interconnecting facts that adults watch more online videos than per day than teens, and the fact that teens watch "less than half as much as the typical user". Culturally, we assume that teens spend their time on youtube, phones and facebook and nothing else. Obviously, this is wrong, and while teens do favor all three of these things, it seems that youtube (and other video sharing sites) are dominated by the adult world. Now, converse to our cultural assumption about teens, we tend to view adults as hardworking and absolutely devoted to their job, and assume that they never get the desire to stare out the window for 20 minutes or neglect their work for something with a little less tedium and a little more lolcats. But, now more than ever, that's wrong too. The study states that while the average day for a teen is tightly scheduled and organized (at least until 3 PM) and with less access to computers in general, whereas adults who work with computers are left alone from 9 to 5 with their PC, tasked with finishing a task by a deadline instead of going from task to task at an appointed time. This opens up a window of opportunity for adults to watch a good deal more videos, and to browse more in general than their teen children.

One thing that I definitely connected with from the comment sheet was "I don't recall life without the internet". That's not to say I was born with a high-speed wireless card clutched in my hand, I do remember running a cord directly from the back of the phone to the computer and hearing the dial-up signal, but I don't have many memories from before my family was enduring that particular screech (It's probably one of my clearest memories because of the sound).
Another comment from the sheet that I thought was pretty descriptive of how my life has changed since the internet is "Because of the internet I never buy or rent movies", although never is a bit exaggerated. With the advent of torrenting (file-sharing) I haven't paid more than 15 dollars for a movie for quite a while. On the whole, although it may take 5 hours to download a movie, it takes a lot less fuss than going to the store. This, combined with the potential of theoretically infinite digital replication (if a friend wants this movie, I can copy it to a thumb drive, give it to him and still be able to watch it on my computer) makes it a much more preferable alternative to buying/renting. It's a simple matter of convenience and long-term effeciency.
If we were to create a boiled-down version of the Nielsen Report for Blackville School, two subjects I would like to compare Blackville's results to the report are their TV v.s. online video habits, and how much they text, to see if they approach, match, or exceed the North American average.